From Australia’s Jewish past
Zara Baar Aronson OBE – Sydney-based journalist, editor, welfare worker, feminist and restaurateur.
Zara Aronson
Zara was born on 4 September 1864. She was the daughter of Moritz Baar, a merchant from Hanover and Landon, and her mother, Zilah. At the age of three, the family moved to England, where she was educated at Bradford Girls Grammar School as well as spent time at Wiesbaden in Germany. In 1879, she returned to Sydney and attended Mrs Morell’s school – a school that had been established to train young girls to be domestic servants to serve in the best houses in the city.
In 1882, at the Great Synagogue, she married a thirty-two-year-old merchant, Frederick Aronson, and they lived near her parents at Woollahra. By now, her father had become known for his import business with Indian and Chinese wares. Zara became known as Mrs Fred Aronson and became active in local charities and joined the committees of the Sydney Industrial Blind Institution and the Queen Victoria Homes for consumptives. By 1890, she had become involved in feminist activities and was an original member of the Women’s Literary Society. She was also a founding member in 1896 of the National Council of Women and by 1900 for twelve months was their correspondence secretary later, moving on to be their honorary secretary from 1906 to 1908. Zara contributed to the Australian Town and Country Journal and the Illustrated London News. From 1897 to 1901, under the pen name ‘Thalia’, she edited the women’s pages in the Sydney Mail and published in 1990 the XXth Century Cooking and Home Decoration, which included some of her own recipes (not all kosher) and ideas for economic decorating.
By 1899, Fred had set up Frederick Aronson & Co., wholesale jewellers and importers and in 1901, she and her husband moved to Melbourne to take charge of the company branch there. Once back in Sydney, she edited the Home Queen from 1903 to 1904. Zara wrote much of the content herself, including the theatrical and fashion columns with the literary page being written by Lilian, wife of Bernard Ringrose Wise – a barrister and politician.
Zara told Miles Franklin that ‘Country people are without a country woman’s paper of their own and this fact makes me almost sure of its ultimate success. I am not a bit afraid of the work you consider may be laborious—work never hurts me, it is the worry that wears’.
During the following year, Zara edited the fashion pages in the Town and Country Journal and Sydney’s Sunday Times as well as being the Sydney correspondent of the Brisbane Telegraph. Around 1912, Fred set up a branch of the jewellery business in Perth, and Zara joined the staff of Perth’s Western Mail. She was described as a ‘most capable journalist’ and wrote directly on to her typewriter.
By 1914, she was back in Sydney and was an original member of the executive committee of the New South Wales Division of the British Red Cross Society, where she organised and ran the depot, which distributed over a million books and magazines during World War I. She also raised some five hundred pounds for the Junior Red Cross through the funds raised from her Excel Cookery Book. In February 1925, she resigned from the Red Cross executive committee in protest against the Society’s funds being expended on other than ex-servicemen. Another of her volunteer roles was, during the visit of the United States Navy to Sydney in August of that year, she organised canteens for the sailors.
Zara was certainly not one to stand still, and by 1918, she had opened the Mary Elizabeth Tea Rooms in King Street, which she ran until the 1930s. A by-product of this was her Mary Elizabeth Cook Book. In September 1925, she became the foundation secretary of the Society of Women Writers of New South Wales and in 1930 its president. She was also a founder of the local branch of John O’London’s Literary Circle. From 1930 to 1937, under her name as Zara Baar Aronson, she contributed irregularly to the Sydney Morning Herald.
She was known as plump and handsome, a bright conversationalist who loved reading and house decoration. She was awarded her OBE in 1936 for her journalism and as a forerunner to many worthwhile organisations and charities. Zara passed away at her home at Darling Point on 1 July 1944 and was buried in the Jewish section of Rookwood Cemetery. She was survived by a son and daughter.
The AJHS acknowledges the following references in the preparation of this story:
Australian Dictionary of Biography (Martha Rutledge); Wikipedia; The Australian Women’s Registry
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